I see you, Friend

To my best friend, C (I'd spell out your name but you'd be embarrassed, I bet): if I survive this, it will be largely due to your efforts on my behalf. You have often worried that you aren't doing enough, that you can't do anything to help me. No one can help, given that I'm not even sure what help means at this stage. I've visited every point on the continuum between wanting help to live, and wanting help to die.

I know that I have been incredibly heavy for you at times, but you are there. I have publicly humiliated myself numerous times in my weird, bipolar-style rages, and almost everyone has abandoned me since that last one, but you are there. I have so often come closer to killing myself than I ever had thought possible--I've even written a handful of goodbyes to important people in my life--but whose potential grief stopped me? Yours, Love. Yes, everyone else's grief was usually there, but even when I could tell all of them to fuck off, I couldn't say it to you.

Maybe it's all rooted in believing that you need me. I don't think anyone else does, not even my daughter. Somehow, being needed by you moves me more than anything else. I can't promise you that I will stay. But if I do, you and your needs should get a huge part of the credit.

I see you, Friend.